


And I Will Hang My Head Low

by spockandawe



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Explicit Sexual Content, Hand Jobs, Humiliation, M/M, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Robot Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-21 23:00:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13153833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spockandawe/pseuds/spockandawe
Summary: It’s a complete surprise when Thunderclash approaches you. You can’t say you’re bothered. More precisely, you should say that you simply… can’t account for it. It takes some time for him to reach you, when he’s pulled aside every few steps for a few quick words with another adoring admirer, so you have some few kliks to consider the situation.You’re spending a little of your off-shift time at “Visages”, which is unusual in and of itself. It’s more to satisfy Ravage than anything else. The way he regularly remarks that several of the Autobots on board aren’t completely intolerable to speak to— It does a poor job of hiding his concern. You have to be a little amused, you’ve been watching patrons trickle out of the bar ever since you arrived, and you can’t think how long it would take the poor mech to walk from one end of the room to the other if the bar was as densely populated as when you arrived.By the time he manages to reach you, you haven’t drawn any conclusions about why he’s here, but you must confess yourself intrigued. Whatever he wants, you feel it must be more interesting than a wasted evening watching frightened Autobots whisper urgently to each other when they think you aren’t looking.





	And I Will Hang My Head Low

**Author's Note:**

> Thunderclash is not so good at consent. Nothing nonconsensual happens, but he isn't great about trying to be sure he has proper consent before nudging a scene in the direction he wants.
> 
>  
> 
> [Tumblr](http://spockandawe.tumblr.com/post/168952936631/and-i-will-hang-my-head-low-spockandawe-the)

It’s a complete surprise when Thunderclash approaches you. You can’t say you’re bothered. More precisely, you should say that you simply… can’t account for it. It takes some time for him to reach you, when he’s pulled aside every few steps for a few quick words with another adoring admirer, so you have some few kliks to consider the situation.

You’re spending a little of your off-shift time at “Visages”, which is unusual in and of itself. It’s more to satisfy Ravage than anything else. The way he regularly remarks that several of the Autobots on board aren’t completely intolerable to speak to— It does a poor job of hiding his concern. You have to be a little amused, you’ve been watching patrons trickle out of the bar ever since you arrived, and you can’t think how long it would take the poor mech to walk from one end of the room to the other if the bar was as densely populated as when you arrived.

By the time he manages to reach you, you haven’t drawn any conclusions about why he’s here, but you must confess yourself intrigued. Whatever he wants, you feel it must be more interesting than a wasted evening watching frightened Autobots whisper urgently to each other when they think you aren’t looking.

As Thunderclash crosses the last small distance to your booth, nobody stops him to talk. The room is torn, half staring at you, half staring at him. He inclines his head to you, glances at the empty seat across from you, and says, “May I?”

You give your assent, of course, and set your datapad aside as he slides a tray of crystallized energon treats onto the table.

“I believe you don’t care to drink,” he says.

You nod, slowly. “However, I also do not—”

“If you’ll allow the presumption, I selected these as the items being served with the smallest impact on your… dietary limitations. They’re very low density, quite hollow.” He picks one up between his fingers and crushes it easily. “The lowest energon content available on the menu, by volume. I hope they will serve.”

Elegantly put, though you don’t know how he learned that information. Perhaps Rodimus shared the news about your fool’s energon, though you doubt he’d voluntarily share much of anything with Thunderclash if he could help it. No, you think it’s more likely he inferred it himself. If he’s been in the medbay since his arrival, he’s had the means to learn it. And this is a clever offering, presented in a circumspect way, given the many mechs doubtless eavesdropping on the conversation right now.

You don’t make a habit of flouting the restrictions you have to abide by on this ship, but the gesture is something that ought to be acknowledged. You take a single treat and eat it, though you note in passing that your rations will taste particularly foul in contrast to this memory. You don’t move to take another, and from the way Thunderclash faintly smiles and nudges the tray to the side, you think he understands.

The conversation is nothing. Frivolous, a distraction. Small talk is an easy game to play without thought, and it leaves you the processing power to keep wondering at what truly brings him to you at this moment. It’s an acceptable way to pass the time as the majority of eavesdroppers tire of listening and return to their own business.

Perhaps you shouldn’t be too surprised, with two old officers talking, that the conversation eventually turns to war. War, history, strategy, and philosophy. It might be more accurate to say that you are unsurprised that the conversation moves in that direction, but you are surprised at how engaged you find yourself in the discussion. You might credit it to simply to a lack of decent companionship on this vessel, though you are nearly certain you could tolerate Ultra Magnus or could have tolerated Ratchet with reasonable ease. No, Thunderclash is clever, intelligent, and thoughtful, with a mind that lives up to his reputation. Truthfully— Given the sheer magnitude his reputation, you would have expected him to fall far short of it. But you find yourself drawn in enough that you begin to probe and test, drawing on your own memory banks rather than simply what comes to mind, drawing out old details you thought you’d never have reason to remember.

“You must acknowledge that Leukotome’s theories on the physical process of memory retention—as dated as they are—are borne out by more modern mnemosurgical findings, suggesting that the atmosphere in which those memories are formed is critical to future recall, which is particularly relevant to the character of a commanding officer’s future decisions—”

Thunderclash is shaking his head. Leaning over the table towards you. He doesn’t have to lean far, you realize, distantly, because you’d already leaned in yourself. He’s arguing, disagreeing with you, but you’re only listening with half a processor. Because now, masked by your arms and shoulders, he’s reaching for your hand with his.

He’s saying something out loud about Meerian philosophy that ought to be painfully idealistic— except for the way he keeps referencing psychological studies _and_ several of your own military campaigns to back his points up. But with his hand, he says, _Would you care to go somewhere_ _more_ _private?_

You’d like to credit yourself that you know chirolinguistics quite well, including all commonly-used single-hand variants. It still takes you a nanoklik or two to properly process that this is indeed what Thunderclash is saying to you. You manage some sort of reply out loud, but respond, _That particular phrasing implies some things I don’t believe you meant._

He shrugs, a small little twitch of the shoulders that you wouldn’t have seen if you weren’t watching for it. _Those implications were the_ _primary_ _intent._

That’s… a surprise, to say the least. And although you’ve spent the conversation trying to puzzle out his motivations, you find yourself even more confused than before. You agree, more from simple curiosity than anything else.

Thunderclash adds, _Your quarters or mine?_

 _Yours._ The bareness of your room doesn’t… shame you. But you’re aware it makes for a lackluster environment for a tryst. To say nothing of what will happen if Ravage happens in only to see you intimate with Thunderclash. At least the strangeness of it all will make for some interesting stories, if you ever see those old friends you can tell them to again. Or if those old friends will be willing to listen to you these days, you suppose.

While you’re wasting time lingering over that melancholy thought, Thunderclash smoothly turns the course of the conversation, saying, “I do have several treatises on the matter that I think you might appreciate, back in my quarters.”

You aren’t so distracted you can’t play along with such a simple game. You say some pretty little words about not wanting to impose, he says some about it being no imposition at all. Your hands quietly disengage, and when you each pull back to your own side of the table, why, there’s nothing suspicious to be seen at all. Now _there’s_ a thought to make you smile. You don’t think there are any Autobots aboard who made a name for themselves in intelligence gathering, but you know Ravage will be very aware of what’s happening the moment he hears any hint of a rumor about the two of you leaving together. You’re quite looking forward to how appalled he is that you would sleep with _Thunderclash,_ of all Autobots.

Still— As the two of you get up to leave, you smoothly interject, “Who are these treatises credited to, if I may ask?”

At first, your only thought is to throw a small little stumbling block into his path, so that he has to invent a name on the spot or come up with some excuse for not telling you. But there’s not even a hint of hesitation before he responds, “Downdraft of Vos.”

Your internal search doesn’t take long to run, and to your surprise, not only is that an author with a number of relevant publications— But it’s an author with a number of publications whose views seem to suspiciously echo certain arguments you’ve heard in some depth very, very recently.

It only takes a few nanokliks for the two of you to leave the bar and reach the peace of the hallway. You tell him, “Then I should be happy to read… your treatises.” A short little pause. “By Downdraft of Vos.”

His face flickers for only a moment before smoothing out into something calm and steady again, but you were watching for that change in expression.

He makes no reply, so after a moment you prod, “Quite a prolific author, it seems.”

Thunderclash nods once, short and tense. “You might say that about him.”

You don’t push any further, for the moment. This is… interesting. You confess yourself to be quite intrigued. So you don’t press the issue while you’re in the hallways, in public, just begging to be overheard. But you only wait as long as it takes to reach his quarters, and for the door to close behind both of you.

“I wouldn’t say Downdraft was as widely read as the quality of his writing would merit,” you muse. You might have walked in silence, but you’ve had enough time to begin any number of interesting searches in your memory banks. “Not widely read, but well received within his field.”

This time Thunderclash doesn’t respond with words at all, or even look at you.

And since he isn’t looking at you, you let yourself smile. “I might wonder why he wrote under that name when such a more well-known name was available to him.”

Quietly, Thunderclash says, “Perhaps then those papers would have simply been read on the merit of that name, rather than the quality of the work.”

“Perhaps,” you allow. Meerian philosophy is a large field, but once you have a large enough sample of a mech’s writing, you can begin to recognize certain patterns. “Though perhaps if he’d been linked to certain other minor writers, those works could have stood as a unit and accumulated a more faithful readership than any single name achieved for themself.

Now Thunderclash looks at you, his optics a little desperate, his shoulders held high and tight. “A single mech that prolific, with interests so widespread, would have drawn attention of a different kind. How long could a mech like that operate without outside interference or interests?”

But then he pauses for a moment, resets his optics, and stills himself. You can hear the rhythm of the ventilation cycle he runs, a spectralist meditation pattern if you know what you’re talking about— and you certainly do.

When Thunderclash looks to you again, his smile is sincere, wide, and calm, and you don’t believe it for an instant. “My deepest apologies,” he says, “This wasn’t my intent when I invited you. Don’t let me distract you from our original plans.” There’s an artful wry quirk to his smile now, and you are well and truly fascinated.

Additionally, your searches are compiling a remarkably long list of probable other aliases beyond Downdraft of Vos. All spread across a remarkable number of fields, several with very decent attempts to obscure Thunderclash’s original speech patterns. You wouldn’t have noticed if you weren’t looking for it, but now that you’re considering the issue, you can feel his voice shining through the writing. You’ve read a number of these papers, some of them many times over. You can hear it now, and wonder at how you ever missed it before.

And one author in particular catches your optic. Oil Spill of Operation Luna II Offensive Eight. One of the most vocal, most cutting critics to ever editorialize on the history and performance of one Autobot Commander Thunderclash.

In the background, you start compiling his most major points. But past that, you can’t look away. What an interesting little tangle this is. You smile. “As you wish. Far be it from me to question to question a decision made by Thunderclash.”

It’s a good gamble. He freezes, his smile too strained for a moment, before he pushes himself into motion. His self-deprecating laugh is a little too forced. “Forgive me, I wouldn’t want to move forward without reference to your wishes—”

“Oh no,” you interrupt. “I’m quite satisfied to let you take the lead.” You move away from the door, deeper into the room. His quarters are very nearly as bare as yours. The only place to sit is on the berth, so you take up station there, so you’re forced to look further _up_ to meet his optics. “I can’t see any reason to do otherwise. Your command skills are utterly unparalleled, and one might go so far as to call them flawless—”

“That is too high a mark for any mech to hope to achieve.” His voice is tight, and you don’t think he realizes his hands are clenched at his sides. “As an officer with so much history of leadership behind you, you must see that is the case.”

You don’t even hesitate before shaking your head. “I must tell you that I’m unable to see anything in your history that I would challenge. Even those things I might have disagreed with in the moment reflect forward-thinking strategy that surpasses the outcomes my decisions would have resulted in.”

Thunderclash takes a step towards you, visibly upset. “I would ask you to— I cannot believe those conclusions are sincere, or that you are being truthful. The history is quite clear, on a great many points—”

You’re already accessing Oil Spill’s publications. “Do you mean your actions in the Crucible? Because it might have led to the deaths of tens of thousands, but without that last offensive, our forces would have had time to be entrenched enough to hold the planet. It was a horrendous cost in lives, but without it you would have lost the war. Or do you want to refer back to Yaltar Seven? You withdrew, and lost _that_ planet, but you were never going to be able to hold it, regardless of what Optimus wanted. You caused enough damage that Soundwave was unable to pursue your retreat and your army escaped with your lives.” You pause for a moment, locking optics with him. “Should I go on?”

“The Crucible,” he begins. “In the year prior, if I had established temporary manufacturing facilities as planned, when we advanced to the Crucible we would have had the weaponry to—”

“You never had the materials to build those facilities, and my soldiers would have seen them going up and prioritized their destruction. That would have sunk time and resources you didn’t have into a doomed project and would have been a poorly considered decision, which is why you didn’t do it.”

You pause for a moment, but he doesn’t reply. After a nanoklik, you add, “I’ve taken the liberty of catching up with the work of Oil Spill of Operation Luna II Offensive Eight. So you can spare yourself the trouble of recreating his writing.”

He looks away before you do. His hands are faintly trembling. He’s right, of course. There’s no such thing as a flawless commander. But what kind of commander would _you_ be if you couldn’t argue both sides of any decision to the best of your ability? And even more importantly, he wants something from you.

Into the quiet, you say, “Is that all this is? A thin excuse to trick someone into punishing you for decisions you think you deserve to be punished for? Because I believe I am completely unable to recall any such history. Is that the only reason you invited me here?”

“No,” he says. You don’t move, simply watching him. That isn’t nearly enough of an answer, and he’s smart enough to see that for himself. He watches you, a little helplessly. Eventually he swallows and says, “No. I invited you here for… other reasons.”

You still don’t say anything.

He runs that quick vent cycle again, and you can follow every step of the meditation. He doesn’t seem much more settled by the end of it, but he manages, “I invited you here to— to frag me.”

The plain bluntness of it takes you back, and hearing Thunderclash say those words is almost as strange as trying to imagine Optimus saying them. What you can read off his face suggests that he’s as uncomfortable with the words as you would expect him to be, but his shoulders are still set, his arms tense, and he stays as his is, facing you directly.

You stand and take one step towards him. His quarters aren’t large. You’re close enough to reach out and touch him now, but you certainly aren’t going to take those sorts of first moves with someone who’s already tried to nudge you in directions you weren’t planning to go.

It isn’t an issue. You’ve barely had time to start considering your next move before Thunderclash surges towards you. _An attack_ is your first wild thought, that you’ve offended him more than you’d realized. But all he does is kiss you, hard and desperate. You weather the kiss, holding firm, staying planted where you are, though you have to brace yourself to take his weight.

His fans are already pouring hot air off against you, though you have to wonder how much of that is arousal and how much is simple upset. You can’t reliably differentiate between them with him, not right now. When he breaks away, you nearly decide to just _ask,_ but before you can muster the words, he’s already talking.

“The papers,” he says. Babbles. He’s smiling in a way that unsettles you, and his face is half-wild. “The papers, treatises, all of it, they’re all lies. Flawed. Wouldn’t have deserved publication without a name behind them.”

He seems more than ready to continue talking, but once he builds momentum, you aren’t entirely sure you can stop him. So you reach up to take his neck and drag him down to you for one more quick kiss, and then guide him down to your neck. He eagerly sets his mouth to your cables, and you have a moment to consider your words. You aren’t going to give him what he seems to want. You think you’re going to make a point of giving him the _opposite_ of what he wants.

“All your papers? Flawed?”

He hums agreement against your neck. You’re still holding him there, but he grabs blindly for your free hand, and guides it down to rest against the plating of his chest. He nudges it it lower and lower. You move where he sends you, but more slowly than he wants, at your own pace.

“I couldn’t disagree more,” you say. “As much as you’ve written as yourself, you’ve written even more under a ridiculous assembly of pseudonyms, and all of those papers were published without any sort of reputation to back them up. The critical reception speaks for itself.”

The noise he makes against you is more pain than moan. He begins to pull away, already shaking his head, but you don’t let him go.

Ruthlessly, you continue, “In fact, critical reception for the papers I’ve picked out as yours so far appears to be proportional to the reception for the papers you’ve published on your own.” You can feel his teeth against your cables, and don’t know if it’s disagreement, warning, or even intentional. “The only significant difference is the number of readers, and that is an insupportable metric to determine quality. The simple logical conclusion is that if your anonymous and credited papers all have comparable critical reception, then your skills accurately reflect the reputation you’ve built for yourself.”

Thunderclash pulls back again, and this time you let him go, his ventilations are audibly ragged, and you can hear him try to run the meditation vent cycle, but twice he loses the rhythm of it halfway through, and then gives it up. He’s still holding your hand tight against the plating of his stomach.

You think he wants to say something, but he can’t quite meet your optics, and only mutely shakes his head.

It would be simple enough to let the situation play out as it may, but the number of things being left unsaid is starting to set you on edge. You consider your words as you wait for Thunderclash to still, then say, “I think you want me to tell you that you’re a failure. An embarrassment. A pretender masquerading as a competent commander.”

He looks up sharply, and his optics are full of naked hope. “It’s true, yes, I’m—”

You hold up your free hand, and he cuts himself off. In the quiet you near a soft noise, and don’t have to look down to know that his panel has opened.

“I refuse,” you say. He freezes, but doesn’t pull away. You don’t make any move towards him. You continue, “Whatever your reasons are for wanting this, I’m not going to profess any opinions so blatantly untrue. You’re a skilled commander, an intelligent writer, and I don’t even need to refer to any concrete history to know that you’re a source of inspiration to countless other mechs, as I think any given day on this ship would prove.”

That makes him flinch. His hand is still locked tight around yours, holding it against him. His optics dim, and you consider telling him to turn them back on, but decide you can afford him that little defense. You say, “You disagree.” It isn’t a question.

“Yes,” he still responds, with such open, naked relief that it embarrasses you to see.

You don’t say anything for a long moment, just… consider. After a few nanokliks, he starts slowly nudging your hand lower down his frame. You let him guide you. Neither of you says a word until your fingers brush against his spike.

“You want me to tell you your reputation is built on lies and misunderstandings. You want me to tell you that you deserve none of it.”

This time his only answer is a moan, and he takes your hand in both of his, wrapping it around his spike. You let him guide you into one long, slow stroke.

And then you tell him. “Your reputation is earned through your own skills and achievements.” He starts to shake his head, but you cut him off. “Deciding that you know so much better than everyone else suggests a very conceited sort of vanity, don’t you think?”

Thunderclash’s optics boot up at that and he stares at you in shock, but you feel his spike jump under your hand.

“No matter how many other mechs have formed an opinion of you, no matter what their basis for doing so, you’ve rejected their conclusions. From what you’ve said here, it sounds like you think they’re too stupid to know any better. _You’re_ more intelligent than they are. And _you_ get to make their decisions for them. What is that, except vanity?”

His fans audibly speed up. He curls forward toward you, desperately clutching at your arm. You move your hand against him slowly, too little to give him satisfaction.

“All this despite a history and set of achievements almost nobody could ever hope to match. Would you tell your friends all this? Would you tell them how worthless you are, and let them wonder that if you think that way of yourself, what must you think of _them?”_

Thunderclash is shaking his head, without words, but when you let your hand drift down past his spike and press your fingers to his node, he gasps.

And you hadn’t even thought about this, but it’s the conclusion that makes the most sense.

You pull your hand from his array entirely, lock optics with him, and ask, “Am I here because you knew how it would hurt your friends if you asked them to lie to you this way?”

He doesn’t respond with words, but it’s answer enough the way he shudders, makes a noise like pain, and overloads without a single touch. He clutches at your arm throughout, but makes no move to touch himself. You watch his spike twitch weakly and drip transfluid onto the floor.

He finally slumps against you for a moment, before pulling away, standing upright. You see his face smooth out into that same agreeable, calm expression he wore for the first part of the evening, and his fans gradually begin to slow and quiet. The only thing that ruins the image is his spike, still half pressurized, still wet with transfluid from the ruined overload.

Thunderclash still smiles like nothing is out of the ordinary. He opens his mouth to tell you some pretty lie, and you beat him to it.

“‘Thank you for the pleasant evening’, I suppose?” You wouldn’t say you’re angry, or even irritated. Just unwilling to let him have this all his own way.

“It was very satisfactory,” he says, which is actually a bad enough lie that you don’t even think he’s properly recovered from that overload quite yet.

You look pointedly down at his spike, still pressurized. His expression flickers for a moment.

“Unless you’d care to stay?” he finishes, a little lamely.

“You’re going to have to tell me what you want. Or did you think I didn’t notice these little attempts to steer me every which way without even a single question about what I was willing to give?”

The shame on his face is about what you expected. But the way his fans speed up fast and sudden is still a little bit of a surprise.

There’s barely any distance between you, but you take the little half-step to close it again. “Well?”

“Again,” he breathes.

You don’t give him your hand this time, just your thigh for him to grind on. He clings to your shoulder rutting his hips down against you, saying half-coherent things about how he uses people, is high-handed and manipulative, is vain, unforgivably, unjustifiably vain.

For a while, you let Thunderclash talk, both to collect your thoughts, and to hear the way his sentences fragment further and further as he grinds against you. You can feel his valve leaving your leg faintly damp, and you can _see_ his spike pressurized and already dripping transfluid as he works his hips against your leg. Thunderclash’s’ face is closed off and blank as he speaks, a quiet, unsteady undertone about how he’s greedy, he’s conceited, he looks down on people, and he _ought_ to feel ashamed—

You cut him off and say, “These feelings are nothing so unique. Do you truly believe that you’re that special?”

He manages a soft, “ _Ah—”_ and falls into overload. This time, he pushes himself away from you, and you can feel the way his hands are too tight on your plating, see the way his legs are shaking. But he stands frozen still as he overloads, his spike twitching and twitching, just drooling transfluid down its length and onto the floor.

Thunderclash struggles to keep his footing when this overload passes. You think his hands on your shoulders might be the only thing keeping him upright. He tries to speak twice before he manages, _“Please—”_

You tell him you aren’t going to touch him until he tells you what he’s saying please over. He moans, quietly, and leans into your shoulder as he moves one shaking hand down to grab your arm and clumsily pull your hand against his stomach again. It’s not quite an answer, but you think you can accept it.

This time, he seems almost too exhausted to speak. And after two overloads, you’re fairly sure you’ll be here a while. But after a moment, he does manage a few words. “Study,” he says. “Study on, on chemical environmental conditions and memory retention. Methodology was— weak.”

It takes a nanoklik to find the paper in question. “Your methodology was weak because of large numbers of categorical data fields, with large numbers of potential values, and even a large data set translated to relative scarcity. You discussed the limitations of your work in the text of the document and discussed potential future directions for analysis when those issues are addressed. I have to believe you remember writing those words, and criticizing this study for limitations you openly acknowledged suggests a false modesty that you want to gratify through my praise.”

He moans brokenly, and after a long pause, tries, “The. Battle for Iacon city— Never should have used aerial assault, was, was a bad decision.”

The conversation moves in starts and stops, and you wonder very much whether the topics he chooses are selected in any particular order, or are just the result of what pops into his head at any given moment. The build to overload is so slow that it takes you by surprise when it finally happens. You feel his spike twitch in your hand, and only pull away just as the overload begins. He moans, soft and drawn out, long open noises. But this time, when Thunderclash overloads, there’s only the smallest little dribble of transfluid from his spike. He still gasps for extra air and leans into you— And by this point you’re taking almost all of his weight. He looks blankly at his spike, and you aren’t entirely sure he comprehends, plus you can hear how ragged and unsteady his ventilations are. You also maneuver him enough that he can at least slump on the edge of the berth instead of being ready to tip over onto the floor the moment you let go of him.

So this time, when he gasps, _“Again,”_ you tell him no.

It takes him a long moment to process the ‘no’ too, which only confirms for you that this is the right decision. Even though he tries to argue with it.

Besides, when you check your chronometer— Right, no is absolutely the correct answer here, because you need to be back on the bridge within the cycle. It’s particularly amusing to you that although Thunderclash is trying to negotiate for another round, even though he can barely talk, it takes only one mention of your duties on the ship for him to accept the answer and let it rest. Something to remember for next encounter— Not that there _is_ a next encounter to depend on, of course.

You take care of cleaning up his room, which doesn’t take long, but you have no idea when he’ll be up for it himself, or how often he receives visitors. It only takes a klik or two, and Thunderclash doesn’t say a word, just watches dazed and slightly swaying as you work. When he isn’t trying to speak, he almost has his usual dignity about him. Until he opens his mouth, you could very nearly believe that he’s his usual staid self.

But when you set aside the cleaning supplies and turn to leave, he does manage a coherent sentence. He says, “May I overload?”

You turn to look at Thunderclash, startled, and belatedly realize that his spike is still pressurized. And after three ruined overloads, you can’t even imagine how badly he needs a proper one. But you also— On a whim, you say, “Ask me next time.”

For a moment, you think you might have overstepped. But then in that last moment before you turn and walk away from Thunderclash and out of the room, you see his mouth spread into a wide smile.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr](http://spockandawe.tumblr.com/post/168952936631/and-i-will-hang-my-head-low-spockandawe-the)


End file.
